And it’s not just me.
These days not caring has become its own industry.
By
The first time I dipped my toe into a world devoid of other people’s opinions was by accident. I’d quit my job after burning out badly (this was a few years before “burnout” had entered the lexicon, and thus I was just crazy), and immediately spent a week giddily driving around the Florida Keys in a red Mustang convertible, top down — a portrait of freedom that instilled envious approval from all those around me.
Upon my return, however, unable to put things back together, I had slowly come untethered from all the expectations that come with being a recognizably functioning person in the world.
For months when people asked me what I did, I’d blithely respond, “Nothing.” Their uncomfortable silence was thrilling. Who knew you could leave people speechless by doing nothing? It also worked as a balm; there was some perverse pleasure in seeing my own inability to figure out my life reflected in others.
Their interest in my situation lasted only, at best, about 60 seconds, and therein lay one of life’s most powerful (if alarming) lessons: Unless you are paying their bills, very few people care or think about what you are doing and why.
As it turned out, this was a good practice run for what came next. Namely, getting older. Whatever residual concerns I had for people’s thoughts on how I was living (or how I looked doing so) loosed their grip considerably when I reached a certain age.
It’s easier in many ways to stop being consumed by what the world thinks of you when you so promptly disappear from the stories the world tells about you. For some women this sudden invisibility feels like a punishment, but for me, a white educated woman with a reasonable amount of resources, it was a huge release.
Not that there is a historical scarcity of women who have stopped caring what other people think. We know these women; they are always older, and usually aunts or witches. They either have their own money or supernatural powers. Consider Aunt March in “Little Women,” Shakespeare’s Weird Sisters or the O.G., Auntie Mame.
These days, however, not caring has become its own industry. A quick search on Instagram for the hashtag #DGAF produces more than a half million results, which suggests that we as a culture are actually quite interested in people believing we do not care.
The most successful influencers, the current president included, appear largely to have curated an image of themselves predicated on the idea they do not care about what you, their legion of followers, think.
This raises the very Carrie Bradshaw-esque question: In a world that runs on likes, is it even possible to be unlikable?
And yet, perhaps there’s never been an easier time to go cold turkey on other people. The truth is, as we move into 2020, against an apocalyptic news cycle, the only opinion I find I’m interested in is history’s. Too bad the future doesn’t have an influencer account.
I Quit!
Glynnis MacNicol is the author of the memoir “No One Tells You This.”
Photo Illustration by Tony Cenicola/The New York Times
